SIX IN HAND. 163 



SIX IN HAOT). 



Coaching men as a rule decry the idea of any one 

 man driving six horses properly, that is, in a coachman- 

 like style. Taking the men as a whole who are usually 

 employed for this kind of work, I must admit they are 

 to a certain extent correct. There are also numberless 

 men who drive a pair and make hard w^ork of it, whereas 

 another — here I mean a coachman — drives four with 

 more ease to himself and even less exertion; so it is 

 with six, although I must be excused for ''blowing my 

 own horn." I can drive six equally as well as four, and 

 really better tnan some who imagine they are in the 

 front row as fourliorse coachmen. 



The six-hoi-se coaches as used in the West are no 

 doubt driven by men who as far as artistic skill is re- 

 quired would be unable to drive a pair down Broadw^ay, 

 and the coachman who could with ease drive a pair 

 in the city wonld b(^ tc^tally inca]>able to guide — 1 can- 

 not say drive — the six horses for a stage over the wild 

 Western plains. 



As an illustration of this fact I wish to mention an 

 amusing incident of which I was an interested spec- 



